Ascending

by James Alan Gardner

Series:

League of Peoples #4

Publisher:

Eos

Copyright:

November 2001

ISBN:

0-380-81329-7

Format:

Mass market

Pages:

361

This is really the fourth book of a series of which I'd only read the
first. There aren't many connections to the previous two books, but there
are plenty of mentions. You definitely want to read
Expendable before reading this book
since it introduces the major characters and provides lots of world
background that this book builds on. The other two are optional, but if
you're obsessive about reading series in order, you'll want to look for
Vigilant and Hunted first.

I was nervous about this book. The protagonist, Oar, was my least
favorite character of Expendable. In the viewpoint of that novel,
she acted like a spoiled ten-year-old, one with few interesting
characteristics and a personality that dragged the story down and became
downright obnoxious by the end of the book. Thankfully, Gardner either
has a much better handle on her or she's a far better first-person
protagonist than a supporting character (and I'm inclined to think the
latter).

Since the events of Expendable, Oar has been dozing in the sun,
slipping into the fugue that plagues her people (as well as recovering
from the injuries she suffered in the previous book). She's woken up by a
strange orange man who tells her that the High Council is on its way to
cleanse the evidence of what happened in Expendable, most certainly
including her, and he's come to spirit her away to be a living witness.
Soon, Oar finds herself having adventures on a living spaceship,
encountering a strange god-like being who is apparently responsible for
her coming back from the dead, reuniting with Festina Ramos (the hero of
Expendable), and exploring the mysteries of one of humanity's
benefactor races.

Oar's frequently childish arrogance, tediously annoying in a supporting
character, is a brilliantly ironic narrative voice. She's a very
self-conscious and self-expressive story-teller, using Capital Letters for
important concepts, adding occasional hilarious footnotes to clarify
things the reader may have missed, and providing a constant MST3K-style
commentary on the progression of the story. The style is postmodern to
the core, consciously self-aware that a story is being told, frequently
addressing the reader, and parodying pulp storytelling every inch of the
way. Oar's side commentary on the Important Points of the story is almost
as good as a running Tough Guide to
Fantasyland and yet it tells a perfectly functional and surprisingly
deep psychological subplot at the same time. Gardner populates the rest
of the book with slightly twisted space opera characters and then lets Oar
narrate with a blunt common-sense honesty that sometimes mimics the
reader's unspoken thoughts and sometimes contradicts them so neatly that I
laughed out-loud. At the same time, Oar betrays a deep uncertainty and
loneliness that she never states explicitly but that gives an inward edge
to most of her comments. Festina occasionally makes an observant comment
on Oar's attitude that opens a new depth of meaning without taking away
any of the postmodern humor. Both sides work.

The first-person voice is far and away the best part of the book. The
plot and the characters provide opportunities for Oar to be refreshingly
blunt or naively ironic, but left on their own, they're not particularly
compelling. Briefly summarized, Oar escapes strange aliens, meets a
different all-powerful alien who will serve as a plot guide for the rest
of the book, accidentally runs into useful supporting characters, gets
trapped by the strange aliens again, confronts them with the help of the
wise and sarcastic guardian, and thereby uncovers Deep Secrets and Saves
Her People. (The capitalization thing is contagious.) The characters
involved are mostly silly, although the wise, all-powerful alien is also
enjoyably sarcastic. A few times, Gardner seems to try for deeper
emotional pathos for characters other than Oar (such as the mail-order
bride or the fate of the male Zarett); each time it feels oddly out of
place among such a parade of surrealistic silliness. Thankfully, Oar has
about as much patience as the reader does and either keeps things moving
along or complains entertainly about how boring they are, which makes the
weakness of her surroundings forgivable.

I like the other part of Gardner's universe (the Spark Lords setting of
Trapped) better than the Expendables and their surrounding
politics. It's all a bit too silly and unbelievable to generate much
emotion and not consistently funny enough to be entertaining as pure
humor. Oar's narrative voice, however, is brilliant, fits the weird
duality of the universe, and somehow makes both sides make sense (most of
the time). By the end of the book, I was laughing at her perspective and
deeply moved by her struggle to stay alive, all at the same time. The
plot is weak and the other characters serviceable at best, but I still
recommend Ascending just for Oar.